Mistletoe Tale
by overthemoonandstars
Summary: Three Percabeth Christmases... and a surprise in each. Futurefic. Oneshot. Fluff.


**Three-part, but I have it in one chapter. It's separated by *one year later* marks and those dash things, whatever they're called.**

**Yes, I have a Percabeth Christmas again. Whoops.**

**But here goes. Hope you guys like this!**

_**Flames will be used to bake me chocolate cookies. Nice/helpful reviewers get some!**_

* * *

It had been Percy's idea to have Annabeth stay for Christmas.

They didn't really celebrate Christmas at camp, so she'd only had a few proper celebrations in her life, when she was with her dad. And in the earlier years, she'd been shunned by her father, and so she'd never felt that Christmas spirit before.

But when Annabeth came over Christmas Eve and had dinner with Sally, Paul, and Percy, she'd been amazed by the coziness and happiness she felt, and now she knew why exactly people were always so giddy over this holiday.

Maybe the mistletoe(placed strategically around the apartment) helped, too.

After dinner she and Percy had sat down on the couch and started talking and cuddling. As it grew late, the talking slowed and then came to a stop until they just lay there on the worn couch, comforted by the glow of the string lights on the pine tree and the warmth of each other.

Annabeth stared at the tree, appreciating its beauty while Percy gazed at her, even more awestruck by hers. Her face shone amber in the lights from the tree, and it reminded him of the night they'd stolen in the stables in the Argo II years ago.

He blurted the first thing that came to his mind. "You look beautiful."

She turned at his voice, a soft smile rising on her face, as if she thought him both cute and hilarious in his Seaweed Brain-ish way.

Percy blushed. "Sorry, I-" she cut him off with a laugh and snuggled deeper into his arms. "And you look handsome."

He rested his head on hers and looked up at the tree, until he realized that the box in his pocket had shifted and was becoming uncomfortable. He surreptitiously moved it and hoped Annabeth hadn't noticed- he needed to time this perfectly.

"I love you," she murmured sleepily into his chest, her fingers curling into the fabric of his shirt.

"I love you too," he replied, playing with her curls and smiling. He took a deep breath. Now was the time.

"Annabeth, will you marry me?"

Startled, she turned her head to look up at him, and he returned the gaze evenly, his eyebrows raised.

Her expression was guarded- like maybe she was worried that someone had spiked Percy's eggnog again. "Percy?"

"I'm serious, Annabeth."

Her expression changed, so that now she was not just shocked, but maybe a little bit hopeful, too.

She opened her mouth to speak, but Percy cut her off before she could. "I love you, Annabeth. I mean, I've met the goddess of love myself and the way she talks about love... I know it's what we have. I've loved you since we first met, and even though I didn't realize it until halfway through the Titan war, I did eventually."

His voice has been slightly shaky when he'd started out, but now he was gaining confidence, his words growing stronger. "I want to marry you and have kids and grow old together, Annabeth. I love you and even though so many things in my life have been uncertain or fake, you're real."

He brought out the little box from his pocket and opened it up to show a ring, and Annabeth's eyes got even bigger.

He brought his face closer to hers and tilted her head up so that she was looking a him. "I love you, Annabeth," he said softly, staring into her eyes. His voice dropped even lower. "Marry me."

Her face broke into a smile, and she wrapped her arms around his neck and kissed him, and he could feel her smile pressed against his.

He responded enthusiastically, and they kissed through the twelve tolls of Sally's grandfather clock. It was Christmas.

Annabeth broke away, laughed softly, and pressed her forehead to Percy's. "I've been waiting for you to ask me that for years, Seaweed Brain."

He grinned, "I'll take that as a yes then."

He didn't get a reply because she was kissing him again.

* * *

_One Year Later_

Percy had participated in No Shave November the month before, and Annabeth teased him endlessly over it. In the end, he'd been adamant about keeping his scruff the whole month long, but come December, he gladly shaved it off. He'd been clean shaven the whole month, but on Christmas Eve Day, he was too busy to regard his normal schedule.

So that's how it came to be that Annabeth laughed Christmas morning, ruffled Percy's hair, and said, "You need to shave, Seaweed Brain."

He looked up at her, raising his eyebrows, then grinned and pulled her down next to him.

Annabeth sat on the couch, warm in Percy's embrace. She was still smiling at his little-boy excitement over Christmas and secretly hoped that he would never change.

Looking around the room, her spirits were slightly dampened at the thought of cleaning up the colossal mess they'd created in ripping open presents. The tree in front of them had to be disposed of, too, and she knew from past experience that it was a hard task she had ahead of her.

There was still some satisfaction, however; Annabeth had designed their apartment. They'd only moved in seven months before(right after their wedding), so there was still a surge of pride every time she looked around at the stylish, modern surroundings. It was impressive.

Even though it was almost noon, they'd been too busy opening up presents to think about food. But now Percy's stomach was grumbling, and so Annabeth laughed and pushed herself off the couch, telling him she'd start the waffles.

"Blue?" Percy looked up hopefully. She laughed again and replied that, of course, she'd make them blue.

She turned around and marched into the attached kitchen, enjoying the view of New York they had from the floor-to-ceiling windows.

They had several boxes of food coloring, because almost everything they ate was saturated with blue color(as was Percy's insistence).

Annabeth reached up on her tip-toes, looking through the top cupboard until he found the box. She pulled it down, opened the lid, and was greeted by an assortment of colors.

She pulled out the blue, but paused for a moment and stared at the pink next to it.

Pink was supposed to be a calming color, used in asylums and prisons to calm inmates down. But for the past week every time Annabeth saw that color, her palms would sweat, her heart would beat faster, and images of little pink plus signs raced through her head.

Why?

Because she'd taken a pregnancy test earlier that week.

And it was positive.

She'd even gone to the doctor's, and his answer was the same.

Not that she wasn't exited, of course. She just wasn't sure how to tell Percy, and she couldn't stop worrying about the baby's safety. A legacy of Poseidon and Athena? It would attract a ton of monsters. Not that it wouldn't be the sassiest little bomb ever, Annabeth thought with a surge of happiness. She was just so worried.

A legacy of both Athena and Poseidon? It would attract a _ton_ of monsters. She knew that eventually they'd start a family and move to New Rome, but she wasn't expecting to leave their new apartment so soon.

She was so caught up in her thoughts that her waffles almost burned. Thankfully, she noticed the timer after a bit and pulled out the food in time.

"Percy!" She called. "Breakfast's ready!"

She set syrup and butter in the table, along with a plate of waffles and jugs of orange juice and eggnog.

She'd never liked eggnog much, or had a big appetite, but after they burned a waffle in the fireplace for the gods, Annabeth poured herself a glass of eggnog and dug into her full plate with vigor.

She didn't realize Percy was staring until she was almost done. She looked up, a forkful halfway to her mouth. "What?" She snapped.

Percy looked shocked by her tone, but answered her nonetheless. "Uh... I've just never seen you eat that much before. And I thought you hated eggnog."

Annabeth blushed, embarrassed. Gah, she was only a month and a half pregnant, and he was already snappy and eating more. "Just really hungry, I guess."

Percy didn't ask more, for which Annabeth was thankful, and their conversation continued as normal.

The rest if the day was uneventful, if you didn't count the couple of eggnog-drunk maenads running around the streets of New York and causing havoc below. Mostly they just cleaned up the wrapping paper and watched cheesy old Christmas movies.

It was late before Annabeth finally got up the courage to tell Percy. She'd been giving herself pep talks ever since breakfast- 'Come on, you can do it! He'll be thrilled!' 'If you can fight Arachne with a broken ankle, you can tell Percy!'- but no matter what, she couldn't help being scared. Monsters and other physical enemies she could handle. Telling your husband that you were carrying his child- well, that was a completely different matter. What if he wasn't ready? What if he left her all alone to raise a kid? What if- _Stop_, she chided herself._ He loves you. He'll stay with you through anything._

"Perce?" She mumbled, curled up next to him with his arm draped around her.

"Mm?" He replied, his eyes closed and his body language signaling that he wanted to sleep.

"There's a present I forgot to give you."

All of a sudden, he was wide awake. "Really? Where is it? Why wasn't it under the tree?"

She smiled and stood up, kissing the top of his head. "It's in our room. I'll go get it."

She walked through the kitchen and opened up the door to their room, crossed it quickly, and rummaged around in her bedside drawer until she found what she was looking for- an envelope with two drugstore pregnancy tests and a sheet with the results she'd gotten at the doctor's.

She stuffed it in her bathrobe pocket and walked out, the butterflies in her stomach making her want to back out and give Percy something else instead. But she persevered until she reached the couch in the living room.

"Here you go." Annabeth felt a flutter of excitement as she handed him the envelope, thinking, This is it.

He pulled out the paper first, not really paying attention to the two little plastic sticks that fell out with it. He slowly read the results, as if he wanted to stretch out the nerve-wrecking moment as long as he possibly could. Once he was done, he picked up the two tests and studied them.

"You're... pregnant?" He said, looking up. He had the same expression on his face as when he'd asked Annabeth to marry him: nervous, but exited and hopeful.

She nodded, biting her lip. "Yeah."

And all of a sudden she was being lifted into the air and twirled, and he was laughing and so was Percy, and then she started hiccuping and crying slightly through her laughter.

He set her down finally but still held onto her as if to never let go. "How far along are you?" Percy asked.

"About a month and a half," Annabeth replied, trying to hold back her tears. _Stupid hormones_, she cursed mentally.

Percy's smile was so wide, she couldn't believe she'd ever doubted she'd get a positive reaction from him. He was as happy and exited as she was, and she almost started crying again in her joy.

Percy cupped Annabeth's face in his hand. "A baby," he breathed. "Gods, I-" but he never finished his sentence as Annabeth leaned up and kissed him, smiling through it all.

* * *

_Four Years Later_

"Wake up! Wake up!"

Annabeth jerked awake, and then Percy was up too.

"Annabeth, what-"

"It's Christmas! Wake up! Let's open pwesents!"

Annabeth sat up and stared, bleary-eyed, at her three year old daughter. She yawned and asked, "What time is it?"

Percy yawned too and handed her his alarm clock, burying his head in his pillow and closing his eyes.

"Daddy, wake up!" The little blonde girl leaped onto the bed and started jumping.

"Charlie Silena Jackson."

The little girl stopped jumping and looked at her mother, and from the the wide-eyed look on her face, she knew she was in trouble. "Yes, mommy?"

"It's six AM. We said that we won't get up until eight. And never," Annabeth said, giving her a hard look, "Jump on the bed."

She started to lie down, but Charlie knelt down and said, "But Mommy! I can't go back to sleep!" She jumped up again and started bouncing. "I'm too exited!"

She squealed as Percy grabbed Charlie and pulled her down to give her a hug. "Merry Christmas to you too, Smarty."

"Daddy, can we open presents?" She said, giving him the big adoring green eyes. (Maybe the cute little kid accent helped, too.)

Percy looked to Annabeth hopefully, and she sighed in defeat. "I've been voted out. Fine."

Charlie squealed in excitement. "Daddy and I got you the best pwesents!" She jumped off of the bed and started pulling Annabeth out, who grumbled. And tried to lie down again. "Five more minutes."

She recoiled as Percy flipped back the covers and carried her out of the room, and she protested the whole way. He laughed and dropped her on the couch once they made it to the living room.

She got up, scowling, about to smack Percy(and say a few choice words about him while covering Charlie's ears) but he leaned down and kissed her. Almost against her will, she kissed him back and wrapped her arms around his neck. They would've continued, but Charlie shrieked, "Ew! That's gwoss!"

Annabeth pulled back and they smiled at each other.

"Merry Christmas," she whispered.

"Merry-" he started to answer, but then Charlie cut him off.

"Come on! Let's open the pwesents!"

Percy and Annabeth pulled apart, reluctantly, and they sat down to open presents. Annabeth was ecstatic with hers- she received several books on architecture(in Greek, of course), a world atlas, a subscription to two architecture magazines, and a few random knickknacks that she appreciated.

Percy got the usual boy stuff- video games, a remote control sailboat, etc...along with a family pass to Disneyland that he was overjoyed with.

Charlie got more presents than Percy and Annabeth combined, as everyone spoiled her- her parents, grandparents(mortal mostly, though Poseidon and Athena had snuck some gifts in), 'Santa', and her parent's demigod friends.

Later in the day, once the wrappings were cleaned up, they'd finished Christmas dinner, and they'd started the one of the movies Charlie had gotten(The Polar Express), Charlie snuggled up next to her mother and sighed contentedly. "What's the best Christmas pwesent you ever got?" Annabeth thought for a moment, then smiled and met her daughter's eyes. "You," she said, smiling.

Charlie furrowed her brows. "I was born in _June_, Mommy."

Annabeth ruffled her hair and said, "Yeah, but I found out I was pregnant with you around Christmas."

Charlie smiled shyly. "Thanks, Mommy."

"You're welcome." She was quiet for a while, then added, "Your dad proposed to me on a Christmas, too."

Percy, having overheard the conversation, plopped down on the couch and put his arms around Annabeth's shoulders and leaned over. "You were my favorite Christmas present too, you know." He confided.

Charlie smiled at that, but then turned to the tv. "Well, my favowite was this movie!" She exclaimed, grinning broadly, then turned back to the movie and payed her parents no more heed. Percy and Annabeth laughed at that, and cuddled closer together.

"I love you," he whispered.

"You too, Seaweed Brain."

"Merry Christmas."

"Merry Christmas."

* * *

**So how'd you like that?**  
**Yes, I know, I'm going overboard with Percabeth Christmas. I even have one more I'm going to write.**  
**I have several other PJatO fics that I'm brainstorming, and perhaps an HP Christmas, too.**  
**...But all in good time. Please review!**

_**P.S. Charlie was named after Beckendorf, and I think the 'Silena' should be self explanatory. Also, Percy and Annabeth did move to New Rome after Charlie was born.**_


End file.
